No matter how happy you are with your job, we’re willing to bet that you have no love for your annual performance review. You know that rite of passage that often happens at the end of the calendar year, where you sit down with your manager and determine what you’ve contributed to the company, if your future goals…

Depending on the type of bosses you’ve had over the years, you might assume that performance review appraisal scores tend to have a more positive bias. The Harvard Business Review did some research and found they’re more negative than you probably think.

There are few things quite as anxiety-inducing as a performance review. You expect to be grilled by your stone-faced superiors about what you have and haven’t achieved in the last year, right? Of course that’s not how it goes, but it’s easy to fall prey to your own anxiety.

Whether it's a poorly received creative project or a crushing performance review, it's easy to immediately go on the defensive when you get negative feedback. Creativity site 99U suggests one way to better handle negative feedback is to start asking questions that will lead to a real solution.

Dear Lifehacker,
I just got my annual performance review at work and let's just say it didn't go very well. Some of it was positive, but a lot of it took me by surprise, and now I'm worried for my job. How do I handle a not-so-great evaluation? I disagree with my boss, but he made some good points and seems to want…